Little Falls transcript. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1876-1894, 1887-10-14
Destroying Railroads in Wal
p. Times. 5 ! y ,=4se Isl

y L-sfzI
In an interesting article on Sherman.
March through Georgia Gen. II. W
slocum, referring to the destruction q,
railroads BY armies, says:
= "A knowledge Of the art of building
railroads is certainly gilmore value to a
country than that of the best means Of
destroying them; but at this particular
time the destruction seemed necessary,
and the time may again come when such
work will be necessary. Lest the most
e1ectual and expeditions method of de-
stroying railroad tracks should become
one of the lost arts, I will here give a
few rules for the guidance of officers who
may in future be charged with this i'm
portant duty. Itshonld be remembered
that these rules are the result of long
experience and close observation. de-
tail of. men to do the work should be
made on the evening before operations
are to commence The number to be
detailed being, Of course, dependent
upon the amount Of work to be done, I
estimate that 1000 men can easily de-
stroy five miles Of track per day, and do
it thoroughly. Before going out in the
morning the men should be supplied
with a good breakfast, for it has been
discovered that soldiers are more
efficient in this work, as we'll on the bat
ile-feld, when their. stomacIs are full
than when they are empty. The oues-
ton as to the food to be given the men
for breakfast is not important, but sug-
gest roast turkeys, chickens, fresh eggs,
anu coffee, for the reason that in an enc
my's country such breakfast will cause
no unpleasantness between the commits
sary and the soldiers, inasmuch as the
commissary will only be required to
provide the coffee. In fact it has been
discovered that an army moving through
hostile but fertile country, having all
efficient corps of foragers (vulgarly
known in our army as bummers), re-
quires but few articles of food, such as
hard-tack, coico, silt, pepper, and So
gar. Your detail should be divided into
three sections of about equal numbers.
l will suppose the detail to consist of
5000 men. The first thing to be done is
to reverse the relative positions of the
ties and iron rails placing the ties up
ana the rails under them. To do this,
section ho.l, consisting Of 900 men, is
distributed along one side of the track,
one man at the end OF each tie Alta
given signal each man seizes tie, lifts
1t gently until it assumes a vertical posi-
ton. and then at another signal pushes
it forward so that when it falls the ties
will be over the rails. Then each man
loosens his tie from the rail. This done,
section No. moves forward to another
portion of the road, and section No. 2
advances and is distributed along the
portion Of road recently occupied by
section No. /. The duty of the second
section is to collect the ties, place them
in piles of about thirty ties each-place
the rails OH the top of these piles, the
center of each rail being over the center
OF the pile, and then set fire to the ties.
Section No. 2 then follows No. l. As
soon as the rails are sufficiently heated
Section No. 3 takes the place of No. 2,
and upon this devolves the most i'm
portant duty, viz, the effectual destrnc-
ton Of the rail. This section should be
in command of an efficient officer who
will see that the work is not sighted.
Unless closely watched soldiers will con-
tent themselves with simply bendig the
rails around trees. This should never
be permitted. a rail which is simply
bent can be easily restored to its origi-
nal shape. No rail should be regarded
as properly treated till it has assumed
the shape of a doughnut; it must not on
ly be bent but twisted. To do the
twisting Poe's railroad hooks are neccs-
sary, for it has been found that the SOL
diers will not seize hot iron bare hand
ed. This. however, is the only thing
looking toward the destruction Of prop
erty which / ever knew Il man in Sher- 4
mans army to decline doing. With
Poe's hooks q double twist can be given
to rail which precludes all hope of re-
storing it to its former shape except bv